The Rescue - An X-MenSHIELD crossover story
by lisacle
Summary: A simple retrieval mission goes horribly wrong for one of Agent Coulson's S.H.I.E.L.D. agents and it's up to the X-Men's own Nightcrawler to save her.


The Rescue

An X-Men/S.H.I.E.L.D. crossover story featuring Nightcrawler and Agent Coulson

by LC Feeney

Coulson burst through the door trailing junior agents and aides behind him. Everyone in the ready room snapped to attention, doing their best to look professional and competent while avoiding prolonged eye contact or drawing attention to themselves. This was going to be unpleasant. Very unpleasant.

"I want to know what the hell happened! We don't leave agents behind. Ever!" Coulson's tone was even but clipped. He hardly ever raised his voice, but that was somehow worse than Director Fury's explosive rage. Coulson's gaze raked the room, settling on Hardison, the only senior agent in the room and the one in charge of the mission. "Agent Hardison, this was a simple retrieval mission. Get in, get the box, get out. What went wrong?"

"Sir, with all due respect ..."

"No, don't even start that. I don't want excuses. I want to know why Sabriana Jameson is not standing in this room right now! I want to know what happened?"

"Well, sir, Hydra evidently knew we were coming. They knew we were there to retrieve the box and they ambushed us. Agent Jameson was in possession of the box at the time of the attack, so they took her."

"They took her? Took her where?" Coulson rounded on an attractive woman to his right, who was holding a clipboard and seemed to be the only one in the room not intimidated by his barely contained anger.

"We've scanned the entire area and have agents fanned out to search in a 50-mile radius, sir. There's no way they could've gotten out of our perimeter. If Agent Jameson is still there, we'll find her."

"And if she's not still there? Then what?"

"We'll find her, sir."

There was a tense pause while everyone in the room shuffled nervously. "I want to see every surveillance tape shot from every angle for the week leading up to this event. I want a complete report from everyone who was involved in this in any capacity. If there is a shrubbery out of place anywhere in the vicinity, I want to know about it."

"Yes, sir. We will find her, sir, and the box."

"I hope so. For all our sakes." Coulson scoured the room with one final glance, then turned on his heel and headed back to his office, scattering junior agents and assistants in his wake.

"I don't want to be disturbed unless it's about Agent Jameson," he said pointedly to the nearest junior agent, closing the door to his office with a definitive click.

"Yes, sir," she said, nodding curtly at the closed door and hurrying back down the hall, glad for the reprieve.

With the door secured behind him, Phil Coulson stalked to his desk and sat down, raking a hand through what was left of his hair. "Sabriana, wherever you are, we will find you and we will get you out of there," he said to no one in particular. He'd lost too many good agents, and even though he knew it came with the territory, it ate at him terribly. Then there was the matter of the box, of course. He picked up a half-full cup of cold coffee and took a drink, grimacing. He pivoted in his chair to face his computer and clicked to wake it up. The surveillance tapes from the retrieval point were already waiting for him, as he'd requested. He took another drink of coffee and started searching through the tapes for something, anything that would give them a clue as to what had happened to Agent Sabriana Jameson and the box she was carrying.

Cold. Cold and dark. Thick, suffocating, palpable dark. And pain. Worse than anything she'd ever imagined. The pain was everywhere, sharp and bright and hard. Every hair, every pore, every sweat gland, every follicle screamed. She couldn't think, couldn't process anything but the pain. She had no sense of time, of space, of self. Nothing but the pain, unrelenting and omnipresent. If she could've formed a coherent thought, she would have cried out to make it stop. She would've done anything, said anything, to make it stop. But there was nothing but the pain.

Sometime later, maybe an hour or a day or a year later, they started coming. Sometimes they'd talk to her. Sometimes they'd just look at her. Sometimes she recognized them - childhood friends she hadn't seen in years, colleagues she worked with, celebrities she'd seen in the movies or on TV, long lost cousins, old boyfriends. She'd try to talk to them, to reach them, to call out to them, but most of the time they seemed oblivious to her suffering. Every once in awhile, they would promise to help her, but they always left without taking her with them, without rescuing her. If she'd had her wits about her, she'd wonder if she was going mad, or had already gone mad. The reality, however, was much, much worse.

Kurt Wagner blended perfectly into the shadows. He was hunkered down on a window ledge fifteen stories up that was much too narrow for anyone without his perfect balance, but that was nothing for him. It had taken him days to track them down, but he was positive that this is where they were holding her. Sabriana. God, he loved her. Ever since they'd met, so many years ago, he'd been in love with her, but had been careful to keep his feelings concealed. It was so rare that he found someone who wasn't frightened of him, who took the time to really get to know him. Their friendship had blossomed over time, but being a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent and a member of the X-Men didn't leave much time for a social life, so they only saw each other infrequently. Still, Kurt had kept in touch with her and had kept tabs on her. He'd been shocked, then angry, then desperate when he'd found out she'd been taken, and had worked every angle, called in every favor, exhausted every resource to find her. S.H.I.E.L.D. had too, of course, but they didn't have access to the same resources he had. The worst of it was the need to sneak around about it. Official government agencies couldn't go around cavorting with mutants, known enemies of the government. All the sneaking around probably shouldn't have bugged him as much as it did since he'd been sneaking around for most of his life, but now there was someone else's life on the line. He hadn't even told Logan what he was doing. He didn't think S.H.I.E.L.D. was trying very hard to find her and rescue her. She was an agent and therefore expendable in their eyes. But not to Kurt. He, Nightcrawler, was going to save her.

It was a simple thing to slip into the building and down the hallway. This wing of the hospital didn't exist on any official records, after all, so it was relatively deserted except for the requisite staff manning the nurses' station. He found her hospital room quickly enough, tried the door to confirm that it was locked, and disappeared into the service corridor and up into the ductwork without attracting any notice. Crawling noiselessly to her room, he peered down at her through the vent. For as high profile a captive as she undoubtedly was, there didn't appear to be much in the way of security, other than the locked door and one, lone surveillance camera directly underneath him and trained on the bed. Indeed, for a hospital room, it seemed unusually empty save for a small crash cart with assorted medical paraphernalia on it, a lone, standard-issue hospital bed and Sabriana Jameson, unconscious and connected to a variety of tubes and wires, but looking nonetheless as beautiful to Kurt as she had ever looked. He fought the urge to crash through the vent, scoop her up in his arms and teleport out of the room to safety. No doubt, a crack organization like Hydra would have other, not-so-obvious security measures in place.

The lights were dimmed, thankfully, giving him plenty of places to hide. It would be a simple matter to disable the camera, but doing so would bring someone to investigate. How could he buy himself a little time to disconnect her from all the medical devices? His eyes scanned the room and lit upon a small stool in one corner. That will have to work, he thought. With a plan in place, he dislodged the vent, giving silent thanks for the fortuitous placement of the camera, and severed the cord with one swift pull. In a heartbeat, he leapt from the vent, snatching up the stool, and turning it to lodge it firmly under the door handle. In the next second, he was back at Sabriana's bedside, scanning the machines before beginning to unplug and disconnect her from the various tubes and wires, thanking God once again that she wasn't on a ventilator or similar life support device. As he worked, some of the machines began to beep in protest, obviously sending out an alarm signal that something was amiss. He knew it was only a matter of minutes before someone would come to investigate. Satisfied that he'd freed her from all the medical devices attached to her, he leaned over to brush a tendril of hair away from her cheek, whispering, "Hello, liebling."

He was amazed when she stirred slightly, her eyelids fluttering open for a second before closing again. "Kurt?" she rasped. "It that really you?"

"The one and only. I've come to rescue you." He was shocked at how frail and helpless she looked. It hadn't been that many days since the attack, when she was the epitome of health and vitality. What on earth had they been doing to her while she'd been their captive? He glanced at the IV pole next to her bed, noting the names on the bags hanging there. His knowledge of medicine wasn't very good, but he recognized the name Methadone with alarm. Was a week long enough to get her addicted to a drug commonly used as a replacement for heroin? She was going to need to serious medical attention to help her through the withdrawals, assuming she survived being abruptly disconnected from her constant drip and drug halfway across the city in the middle of winter. Kurt was beginning to wonder if he'd made a grave mistake, trying to rescue her by himself.

"Please be real," she said, opening her eyes again, her tongue darting out to lick at her chapped lips. She didn't appear to be beat up at all, but she looked like she'd been sick for months rather than days.

"It's really me and we're really getting out of here," he said as pulled back the hospital-issue blanket and sheet. He thought he could hear voices outside her room and he knew they had to go, now. He slid one arm under her shoulders and one under her knees, pulling her close to him and angling her feet off the edge of the bed. Yes, there was definitely someone outside her door now, and they were trying the handle and shouting for backup. Glancing down at her thin hospital gown, he snatched the blanket off the bed, wrapping it around her and easily lifting her into his arms. "Can you put your arms around me, geliebte?"

"Yes," she murmured, and tried to clasp his neck. She could barely lift her arms and her head lolled against his chest. He could tell that she was struggling to regain consciousness and to help, but the drugs in her system were weakening her too much.

He started toward the vent about the time the first security guard crashed into the door, trying to dislodge the stool. One or two more good hits and the door would give way. What was that old saying about no plan surviving contact with the enemy? He said a quick prayer that he'd be strong enough to do what he had to do and then teleported out of the room just as three security guards tumbled in through what was left of the door.

Nightcrawler landed on the narrow window ledge, barely holding onto it with his toes while keeping Sabriana clasped tightly in his arms. Not having his hands to balance made the trick extremely difficult, but he didn't have time to worry about that right now. It wouldn't take long for the guards to figure out where they'd gone, and he needed to be well away from this building before then. He heard Sabriana gasp sharply and glanced down at her, worried. The bitter cold of the night air had shocked her into consciousness and she was disoriented and uncomfortable. "Nightcrawler!" she said, "Where are we? What's going on?"

Nightcrawler took a deep breath, glancing through the window to see the guards advancing toward him, weapons drawn. "Hang on, schatz," he said through gritted teeth and teleported again. He hated making blind jumps, but he was fairly certain the patch of roof he was aiming for was free of protrusions that would impale them if he materialized on them. It wasn't very far from the window ledge to the roof, but teleporting with a passenger twice in rapid succession was incredibly draining. He landed hard and started to lose his balance, angling his body so that he protected Sabriana from the brunt of the impact. He scrambled back into the shadow of an enormous HVAC unit, panting and clutching her close to him. He had a moment of panic when he realized that she was unconscious again, and he prayed that she was alright as he strained to listen for sounds of their pursuers. They needed to get out of here quickly, but several teleports in rapid succession was rough on someone as strong as Logan, so he didn't dare risk it with Sabriana in her weakened state. And even though they were surely in grave danger, he relished the sweet, warm weight of his love against him. He treasured this moment alone with her, however brief and precarious. If only there could be more of these moments, lying together in each other's arms, without the imminent threat of discovery and death, of course. Almost as if she'd sensed it too, Sabriana stirred slightly, pressing herself closer to him. He tightened his arms around her protectively. "It's okay. I'm going to get you out of here," he whispered against her hair.

"It's cold," she murmured.

"You'll be warm soon. We just have to get off this rooftop." As if on cue, Kurt saw a sliver of light as a door opened on the opposite side of the roof and he knew his rest break was over. Standing swiftly and hoisting Sabriana up in his arms again, he moved to the edge of the roof. He glanced down at her one last time, flashing her what he hoped was a reassuring smile as her eyes fluttered open again and her arms snaked up and around his neck to hold on. Taking another deep breath, he slipped over the edge of the building and into the night. By the time the security guards got to the spot where they'd hidden, they were nowhere to be found.

Coulson sat back in his chair and sighed. He'd been burning the midnight oil pretty much constantly since the botched retrieval mission and tonight was no exception. Against his better judgement, he'd decided to bring some work home with him and as he glanced down at it now, spread all over the coffee table, he knew he was only kidding himself. He needed to get back to the office in case there was any word about Agent Jameson or the box. He leaned forward to gather up his papers and froze as the tiniest of breezes, barely perceptible, blew past him from somewhere down the hall. He stood and drew his service revolver in one quick movement, inching around the edge of the sofa and down the short hallway toward the bedroom door. He wasn't sure what had set him off, but he knew there was no reason for a breeze to be coming from his bedroom.

He nudged the door open gently and peered inside the darkened room, noting that the drapes had been pulled back and the window opened, the sheer curtain liner fluttering gently in the moonlight. Easing into the room toward the window, he glanced down at the bed and froze again. Someone, or something, was under the covers. He moved to the bedside and pulled the covers back to see Agent Jameson lying there, unconscious and wrapped in a thin blanket. He placed a hand gently on her neck, letting out an audible sigh of relief when he felt a weak pulse, and then stood up to scan the room again. Something pricked at his awareness, but he could see nothing in the darkness.

"Who's there?"

"Lose something, mein freund?"

"Nightcrawler?" The voice seemed to be coming from the direction of the window, but as far as Coulson could tell, there was no one there.

"Take care of her, Herr Coulson. They've had her on a constant Methadone drip. The withdrawal can be deadly."

"Who? Where was she?"

"A Hydra facility on the other side of town." Nightcrawler turned to go and Coulson thought he caught the merest glimpse of his yellow eyes in the darkness.

"Wait! She had a box ..."

"Bitte, Agent Coulson." There was a soft "bamf" and he was gone, leaving only a puff of brimstone-scented smoke in his wake.

Sabriana Jameson tugged her hat down around her ears a little more snugly and strode across the parking garage toward the stairwell. It was damn cold, as it had been for weeks now, and she wondered for the umpteenth time if she would ever be warm again. She put her key in the gate and opened it, but stopped suddenly and turned to see Nightcrawler hanging upside down from a support beam just inches from her. "Kurt!" she exclaimed. He grinned that boyish grin she found so endearing and swung down to stand before her, bowing deeply and pressing her hand against his lips.

"Hello, liebling. How are you feeling?" He stood as she threw her arms around his neck and pulled him into her embrace, and he gladly returned the hug.

"Oh, my God, I am so glad to see you! I've been trying to get in touch with you. Where have you been?"

"Oh, you know, official X-Men business. Top Secret stuff.

"I wanted to thank you for saving my life."

"For you, anything. You look as good as new!"

"Thanks to you. How can I ever repay you."

"All in a day's work for a gallant hero like me. However, a kiss from the fair damsel wouldn't be refused." They'd reached the door of her apartment and he turned to face her, flashing her his most charming, brilliant smile. Without a word, she wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him close and kissing him deeply. He hesitated for only a moment, having expected only a friendly peck on the cheek, but this was much more and certainly not unwelcome. After a bit, she pulled away slightly and smiled up at him. Then she turned, unlocking her front door and pulling him inside after her.


End file.
